Lost Lhasa: Heinrich Harrer's Tibet

This collection of 200 photos and thematically ordered essays conjures up life in an isolated, innocent Tibet before the Chinese invasion of the 1950s. Though he presents himself humbly, Harrer (author of the 1953 classic Seven Years in Tibet) is clearly remarkable: a celebrated Austrian mountaineer who escaped a British prison camp to enter Tibet in 1944, he learned the language, developed a friendship with the Dalai Lama (then a teenager), worked on the country's reforestation and helped build Lhasa's sewer system. His black-and-white photos, though occasionally grainy or mundane, capture the uncommon tapestry of Tibet: hatted servants leading the horses of government ministers, the Dalai Lama's formidable but kind mother, two honorees at a New Year's celebration clad in huge fur caps and Russian brocade robes. Harrer's photos are complemented by brief essays on such aspects of Tibetan culture as its penchant for irreverent street songs; its pilgrims' arduous rites; and its appreciation of the national drink, butter tea, which purportedly replenishes the body's stores of salt, fat and water. (Oct.)